Field hockey: St. Bernard's notches key league victory (video)

There was no way the St. Bernard's field hockey team wouldn't be ready to face league foe Holy Name.

The Bernardians played a strong all-around game throughout Tuesday's matchup, including displaying a strangling defense anchored by senior captain Jillian Schultze, en route to a 1-0 Central Mass. victory.

"Our whole goal this entire season was to get to playoffs and be .500 or better," St. Bernard's coach Kate DelleChiaie said. "For us, playing Holy Name, it's also a league game so league games I feel are 100 times bigger. When we play Holy Name we know it's always going to be tough, and I think the girls definitely rose to the occasion."

St. Bernard's, which improved to 4-3-3 overall and 2-1 in the league, bottled up the Naps in the second half, refusing to surrender the lead.

The Naps (3-5-2, 1-3) registered six penalty corners in the second stanza alone, but were unable to get a shot on St. Bernard's freshman netminder Hannah Wilmot.

The reason for Holy Name's inability to crack St. Bernard's defense was simple: Schultze.

The senior defender swept away three Naps corners herself, including breaking up Meaghan Sheering's scoring bid with a hard blast up the near sideline and away from danger.

"She's my flyer," DelleChiaie said.

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"She's the kid who breaks up every single corner. She probably breaks up 90 percent of the corners that she flies out on. She's quick, she gets her stick on them. For us, if she doesn't, we have our backs up against the wall.

"Jill was tenacious and had great drives up the field and she saved us on a lot of corners. She was able to capitalize on any mistakes and she got the ball out of our end of the field. She kept the ball down, all of her hits were legal. She's a great leader for us. She led by example, and she's usually the only voice I hear on the field."

Schultze certainly has radar-lock on the ball when the opposition is trying to score on a penalty corner.

"When I do it, I focus on trying to watch for them to hit the ball in certain directions," she said. "If you watch where they're going, you can see where they go and then I try to cut in front of it."

Schultze wasn't alone in defending the St. Bernard's end, as Reilly McCobb, Morgan Gelinas and Erin Constantino also stonewalled Holy Name with strong defensive play.

"My defense, they were definitely the heroes of today, 100 percent," DelleChiaie said. "They are like that almost every single game. I can always count on my defense."

Communication is the key to strong team defense, says Schultze.

"Defensively I think we did pretty good," she said. "We worked on a lot of talking. We sometimes struggle with talking, but we did really good with that today."

St. Bernard's had plenty of chances to expand its lead, but high-percentage shots by speedster Tarah Crowe and Alicia Bizzotto were denied by Holy Name goalie Laura Yurkevicious.

"We had several great offensive opportunities," DelleChiaie said. "We didn't always capitalize on them, but we got the one goal we needed."

St. Bernard's got that marker with 15:36 remaining in the first half.

Spark plug Molly Richard -- a junior -- drove a perfect ball into the circle through several Holy Name defenders and onto the stick of junior Gabriella Paolini, whose one-timer rattled the back of the cage to give the Bernardians a 1-0 advantage.

"Molly sets up a lot of our goals with her sheer athleticism," DelleChiaie said. "She can beat defenders, and if my other forwards are where they are supposed to be, they'll get an open shot. Bella works so hard. She was in the right spot and she's got a big hit. I wasn't surprised it was the two of them."

Richard, a scoring forward who was moved to the midfield before the Leominster game on Sept. 9, stood out by showcasing her speed and skills to control the center of the field for St. Bernard's.

St. Bernard's outshot Holy Name 7-1, but each team each had nine penalty corners.

"I feel like we definitely were the better team today," Schultze said. "We did a lot of the little things that helped us through.

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